Shot Me Down
by friend9810
Summary: Most people are happy when they meet their soulmate. Some people wait their whole lives for their soulmate. Well, being conventional was never in the cards for Ruby or Roman anyways.
1. Chapter 1

The job was supposed to be an easy one. Go in, grab some Dust, and get out. A routine robbery. Roman might've have put on the façade of complete cockiness, but he was still very aware of his surroundings. He did not get to the top of his trade by being careless. Still, as he strode up to _From Dust Til Dawn_ , he was feeling quite good about the whole thing.

He opened the door with a flourish and the lackey followed. As he pointed Melodic Cudgel at the old shopkeeper and instructed him to hand over the Dust. Making the smart decision and choosing his life over the goods, the shopkeeper complied. It was all going so well until suddenly it wasn't. Nothing drastic happened yet, but he heard faint music coming from the corner of the store. The Faunus didn't seem to care or notice, their contempt for him were as thinly veiled as his contempt for them, but he did think that they would at least care about what a possible witness could mean to their operation.

He took a few seconds to weigh the pros and cons of sending someone else to go check it out. Pro: He didn't have to move. Con: They would be incompetent and fuck everything up. In the end he chose to do it himself. Besides, wasn't the saying "if you want a job done right do it yourself"?

He rounded a corner and to his surprise a girl was standing near the magazine rack. A red hood was over her head so he couldn't tell what she look like, but if the black and red skirt was any indication then he knew it was girl. "Hey there! Isn't it past your curfew?" He called out.

The rock music continued to blare from her headphones. He sighed and used Melodic Cudgel to tap her shoulder. He was tempted to just shoot her and be done with it all.

She pulled the hood off and the headphones and turned towards him. "Excuse me—" She stopped mid-sentence. Her eyes seemed to widened, big grey eyes looked him up and down.

"Um kid? Do you think you can scram? Go home mama and papa." He looked down at her. She was a few years younger than him, maybe in her late teens.

He was growing more and more irritated by her lack of response. Then he followed her gaze to the soulmark on his right wrist right wear the cuff of his coat was riding up. A small rose marred his skin since he turned thirteen when the marks first appear. Honestly, he never gave it too much thought. People like him don't really get happy endings so he never bothered imagining one.

He was going to talk again but she seemed to have found her voice. "Sorry! It's just, well, you're my soulmate! This is cool! And awkward, I didn't think my soulmate would be old." She said that last part with a bit of a sour tone, but she seemed delighted nonetheless.

For a moment there Roman was at a loss for words. He chose to ignore the 'old' comment. " _What_? No. I am not anyone's soulmate. Sorry, Red."

"Pretty sure everyone has a soulmate. Look." She held up her wrist and sure enough there was a small rose identical to the one he had on his skin.

Before he had a chance to reply one of his lackeys broke in, "Boss, we are ready to go."

For the first time Roman was actually thankful to the Faunus. Now he could just get out of dodge and never have to deal with the kid again. He could name a million and one reasons as to why having a soulmate would be awful. At this point he just wanted to go home, maybe drink something strong, and try forget this ever happened.

"Boss?" Red looked from Roman to the lackey and back to Roman. Her face fell and something seemed to change in her eyes as realization dawned. "Oh."

"Yeah. See? Go find another soulmate."

"I'm not really sure it works that way." She then took on a fighting stance and put forward the red scythe she had been holding. Between everything Roman seemed to have ignored the thing, at least until she moved it so that it unfolded to its full size. It was taller than he was! "Like it?" She asked. "Built it myself. Huntress-in-training. I don't think it would've worked out between us anyways." With that she swung it out at him.

A/N: I had to fall in love with Roman Torchwick…. I had to become Rosewick trash….

This is the first time in over a year that I've written anything other than Teen Wolf trash (for an equally if not worst ship) so bear with me. The severe lack of Roman fic prompted me to write this and idk it began as an idea for a soulmark au but then it turned into this and I don't know where I'm going with this. I do know that I think I'm going to have Roman as 21.

The next chapters should be longer though.


	2. Chapter 2

It had been two days since the incident with Red at the shop. Roman managed to get away with the dust, but just barely. Apparently his 'soulmate' could fight. It had cost him a lecture from Cinder that almost made Roman wish he had been caught. Now he was just laying low in his apartment trying to figure out what to do next and waiting for Cinder's orders.

Two days and Roman was feeling pretty shitty. Business was fine except Cinder wasn't tell him anything of importance relating to her plans. He hated not knowing things especially when those thing probably could end up saving him.

Besides that he had no real complaints, no, the only thing that was bothering him was the stupid soulmark. It was burning. At first Roman was content at ignoring the pain, he had had a lot worse before, but now it was getting too much for even him to bare. If it got more irritating it would start effecting his business and his health, two things he actually kind of care about. He didn't know much about soulmarks, he never really cared, but he did some research and apparently the pain would increase unless he got in contact with his 'soulmate' again. That was not something he wanted to do, but he would if he had to.

He took off his scarf and coat, flopping down on his bed in just a black t-shirt and jeans. His mind was running a mile a minute there was no way he was getting any sleep tonight.

He didn't even want a soulmate. He always thought the whole soulmark thing was archaic and not for him. The universe pairing two people together for life. What was wrong with trial and error? It could be more fun that way at least. Dating around and seeing if you find the 'one' seemed like a much better idea then hoping the person who has the same matching branding is a perfect fit. There were countless stories of 'true love' and 'happily ever afters' in the news as a result of the soulmarks. What the news doesn't tell is all the times the relationships didn't work out. The abuse, depression, lying, etc that sometimes resulted.

He didn't really care about all that. He didn't want this relationship to work. She was a huntress, he was a thief. Maybe in another fucked up reality it could have been a forbidden love story, but not this one. What mattered now was getting the pain to go away.

Seeing as he wasn't going to get any sleep he thought he might as well get something productive down. He pulled out the drawer of his nightstand and grabbed a scroll out of it. He had a couple in case of emergencies, all untraceable. He figured he would just have to hunt down the little huntress, being in the same proximity should do the trick, at least that's what he hoped. He could make this work. If all else failed he could always kill her.

After about ten minutes of searching he finally found her. She was a student at Beacon, (surprise, surprise) and that her name was Ruby Rose (He wasn't far off by calling her Red). There wasn't too much about her though you can't really know someone from their file (He knew from experience, they got his eye color wrong. How was that even possible?). The rest included a picture of her but he already knew what she looked like, some family background, and her age. She was sixteen. Any younger and Roman would have vomited.

Now it was just a matter of getting near her without a battle breaking out. As much as he liked a good fight there were too many variables to consider. News of their bond could get out which would damage his carefully crafted reputation, or the most unbelievable thing could happen—she could beat him and he'd go to jail. Neo would kill him if she had to break him out again.

Pressing a few buttons he decided that messaging her would be the best option.

 _Romate: Heya Red, we need to talk._

He sent the message off. It seemed simple enough and rather direct. He just hoped she was awake as well. Luckily, she responded quickly.

 _CrescentRose: You! How did you get my #? Creeper_ _ **.**_

Well that's just unhelpful.

 _Romate: I'm a criminal. It's not that hard to hack Beacon's database. Anyways, I think we need to meet._

 _CrescentRose: Wanna give urself up?_

 _Romate: Ha. Ha. No._

 _Romate: I want to get rid of this pain from soulmark. I'm assuming you have it as well._

He couldn't help but notice that she took several minutes to reply. She could've gotten distracted by something or she knew he was right and was weighing her options. He guessed it was the latter.

 _CrescentRose: I have it. It's super annoying. We almost killed each other. Can I really trust to meet you and not get killed or something?_

Well, she wasn't stupid. Maybe the universe was as incompetent as he thought.

 _Romate: We have to do something and that's the only thing I know that will work. I won't try to kill you if you don't try to kill or jail me. Scout's honor._

 _CrescentRose: You were never a scout. And can I think about it? I would have to find a time when I could go off on my own and that'd mean lying to my team and there's just a lot of things to consider._

Roman ran a hand through his hair, frustrated. He really just wanted this down and over with, but pressuring her probably wouldn't be a help to anyone. Though it was interesting that she was lying to her team, she must have not wanted them to know that a renowned criminal is who fate decided she should be with. At least it made things easier for him, only having to deal with one huntress instead of four.

 _Romate: I'll give you til morning. This mark is really irritating._

 _CrescentRose: Ok. Btw your username is stupid._

On second thought maybe killing her was the best option.

A/N: Super sorry about the lack of update, a month in a hospital and then college makes updating hard. However I am back! Yay! Thank you for all the support, it meant a lot.

Longer chapter to come now that I have an idea of what this story is going to do.

The Romate thing was basically me being like "roman+soulmate= romate ahaha I'm hilarious." and nothing better came to mind.

Also if you ever want to fangirl over RWBY or anything else feel free to come bother me on tumblr at: killjoywhatsername


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